Star-Ledger truck drivers ratify labor agreement

The union representing Star-Ledger truck drivers ratified a new labor agreement Tuesday night, ensuring the state's largest newspaper will not be sold or closed.

The union agreement was the last of three conditions set July 31 by Advance Publications to maintain ownership of the nation's 15th-largest daily paper. Losses buffeting the newspaper industry prompted the ultimatum, and the paper would have been put up for sale or eventually closed had the vote gone the other way.

In addition to concessions from the drivers' and mailers' unions, management sought buyouts from 200 of the newspaper's 750 full-time, non-union employees. Management announced last week it had secured enough buyouts to meet that condition.

"I'm thrilled The Star-Ledger will remain part of our family," said Donald Newhouse, president of Advance Publications, which has owned the paper since 1935. "I have confidence in The Star-Ledger management team, and I think we can do in the future what we have done in the past: serve the needs of our readers and advertisers."

Publisher George E. Arwady was equally effusive in a letter published in Wednesday's editions.

"As of today, The Star-Ledger family has achieved the three objectives we outlined in July as necessary to our survival," the letter read in part. "I use the word family, because the past few months have underscored how deep the bonds are among the people who produce this great paper, as well as those who read it."

The Newspaper and Mail Deliverers' Union approved the agreement by a vote of 161-6 during voting that lasted from 9 a.m. until 10 p.m. at its headquarters in Queens. All 1,700 members of the union throughout the New York area were eligible to vote; 90 were Star-Ledger drivers.

The union essentially agreed to forgo wage increases it had won through collective bargaining, instead accepting wage freezes with some annual lump sum payments. The newsroom has had a similar wage freeze in place for three years. The drivers also agreed to drop grievances filed after the newspaper closed a printing plant in Montville, eliminated jobs there and consolidated printing in Piscataway.

Union President Douglas Panattieri Jr. said he had urged the membership to ratify the agreement, and drivers leaving the union hall on Tuesday said they heard the message.

''Nobody wants to see somebody lose their job," said John Shields, a driver for the Daily News in New York.

It was unclear Tuesday evening precisely how many full-time non-union employees will be leaving the newspaper, but upward of one-third of the newsroom staff will go, executives said. Arwady pledged in his letter that The Star-Ledger will continue to be a newspaper the state can be proud of, and Editor Jim Willse said plans for continuing in that vein will begin immediately.

"The goal was to have 130 newsroom staffers sign up for the buyout. Considerably more than that did," Willse said. "Over the coming days, we need to decide how many of the buyouts will be accepted, and we'll have to start making plans for the paper going forward."

Neither Willse nor Arwady would say precisely how many employees signed up for the buyout, which offered employees one year of pay and health benefits. Employees had until Oct. 1 to sign up, and because they were given seven days to rescind it won't be entirely clear how many still want the deal until the close of business Wednesday.

The Star-Ledger is New Jersey's dominant paper with circulation of 350,000 papers daily and 520,000 on Sunday. Advance owns 27 daily newspapers, including The Oregonian in Portland, Ore.; The Plain Dealer in Cleveland; and The Times-Picayune in New Orleans. It also owns Conde Nast Publications, the second-biggest magazine publisher in the country.

Newhouse said in previous interviews that The Star-Ledger and a sister paper, The Times of Trenton, stood to lose $30 million to $40 million this year. The future of the Times also was tied to Tuesday's union vote, as it is laid out and published by The Star-Ledger. Asked earlier Tuesday if the buyouts and union concessions would put the paper back in the black, Newhouse said: "With these changes we are able to right-size The Star-Ledger to meet today's economic conditions."

He said he believed if the current economic downturn reverses itself and "structural problems" at the newspaper are rectified the future could be brighter.